'Bunheads' Recap: Episode 9, 'No One Takes Khaleesi's Dragons'

By
Laura Motta and Aileen McKenna
| Posted Aug. 14, 2012, 12:04 p.m.

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Photo Source: ABC Family

As Season 1 of Bunheads creeps to a close, Michelle creeps closer to a full-on midlife crisis, Baby Megan Hilty creeps closer to having a fling with cutie Charlie, and Boo creeps closer to being someone we kind of hate.

In which more "Gilmore Girls" recycling threatens to obliterate all...This week's episode opens in a coffee shop run by a guy named Bash, who happens to be played by that droll dude who played Kirk on "Gilmore Girls" (Sean Gunn). Because recycling whole characters, conceits, and set pieces is clearly not enough. He is, of course, a laser-intuitive, award-winning, marginally amusing barista who anticipates Michelle's skinny-bitch coffee order. Next, Michelle heads to the studio, where we find Fanny teaching/abusing her young charges in a desperate search to find the ideal Clara for her annual "Nutcracker." With Sasha waist-deep in her rebellious cheerleading phase, pickings are slim. Michelle tells Fanny that her choreographer friend, Richard, is doing a big production of "Follies" and she'd like to audition. After eight minutes of superfluous hemming and hawing – Michelle calls him. He doesn't answer. Outside the studio, Michelle discovers the B-list bunheads - the Dullard and Baby Megan Hilty - hiding in the bushes from masochistic Fanny. Charlie, the Dullard's brother, turns up in his car to take them wherever bunheads go when they're not buying rosin or cutting off their callouses or whatever, but not before we get a lingering unflattering shot of Boo's backside. Charlie insists that Baby Hilty sit in the front seat, continuing foreshadowing of their exasperatingly awkward non-romance. Later, at Oyster Bar, the bunheads have clearly forgotten Sasha's epic previous-episode meltdown, and Sasha has forgotten that her hair used to be blue, and everyone's all friends. Sasha expresses zero regret about ditching ballet for ultra-easy cheerleading.

In which clumsiness in beautiful women is SO ACCEPTABLY ADORABLE, you guys... Back at Bash's, Michelle makes a second attempt at coffee, and at calling Richard the "Follies" choreographer, but doesn't succeed on either front. So the answer is clearly to make Sutton Foster fall down and drop things, because that worked so well in "Thoroughly Modern Millie." As the falling and dropping ensues, Fanny calls and asks Michelle to open up the studio. She arrives only to find Truly there, and she and Michelle get into a competitive snit over who does a better job at opening the studio. The studio needed to be opened because Boo and her sweet, vertically challenged dance partner Carl need to rehearse their dance for a big supermarket opening. The supermarket will have stamps, sweet-and-sour chicken, and lightning-fast coffee prepared by non-award-winning baristas, which thrills Michelle to the blunt-cut tips of her suspiciously lifeless hair. Michelle wants to stay and run the rehearsal, but Boo begs her not to, confessing that she has a crush on Carl, which is news to us, considering that she was monstrously mean to him in the last episode. Later, still bereft of a Clara, Fanny tells Michelle that calling Sasha is not an option.

In which Michelle somehow still cannot get a cup of coffee... Michelle heads back to Bash's, where there's no line. You'd think poor caffeine-deprived Michelle would have hopped in Hubble's convertible and hit up the nearest Starbucks by now, but instead, she tries to light a fire under Bash. Even with an empty store, Bash can't be prompted to speed things up – or be less annoying—so Michelle storms the heck out. Back at the studio after Michelle’s tap class, we find out that the Community Council has successfully squashed the new grocery store with some kind of zoning violation and it will emphatically NOT be opening. Never you mind that the timing of this is impossible, considering how close opening is, and in reality it would never happen. However, we’re in Paradise, which is emphatically NOT reality. Anyway. Boo is sad because she won’t get to dance at the opening with Carl and Michelle is sad because, duh, COFFEE. Sad Boo, Dullard, and Baby Megan Hilty go to visit Sasha at the basketball game where Sasha loses all of her perky happiness and berates the squad for cheering so enthusiastically for a team full of losers. Meanwhile, Baby Megan is making an ass of herself in front of Charlie, because apparently she STILL does not understand Girl Code, and Boo is trying to hit on Carl but he is not having it.

In which we finally get to stop waiting for Godot…Michelle pops by the Oyster Bar to leave a stack of flyers for her “Save the Supermarket!” meeting and our old (hot) friend Godot—who has apparently not disappeared to Costa Rica again—is working the bar. He’s also looking vaguely dirty in a way that is somehow only attractive and not horrifying, and smiling like the sun. We approve. While dropping off the flyers, Michelle does her thing and talks a mile a minute about nothing, which to Godot, is somehow only attractive and not horrifying. Godot is a little smitten with Michelle, y’all! Hopefully this means we’ll get to watch him make out with someone soon. Either way, we leave the Oyster Bar and find ourselves at the Dullard's house, where Baby Megan is acting like a moron in front of Charlie again, and the Dullard is finally catching on. And thank god, because it’s about time someone talked sense and pointed out to Baby Megan Hilty how colossally awful it is to be all wanting to hook up with the guy your best friend has been in love with for years. Worst. Friend. Ever.

In which Boo almost gets the guy…Michelle’s Neighborhood Council of Doom meeting is finally happening, and she’s scrounged up six people—their biggest audience ever—mostly by lying to everyone about the true nature of the event. All of that lying backfires because no one there actually cares about the supermarket. While Michelle argues her case to an unmoved Council—like they’d let a grocery store screw up the theme-park perfection of their sleepy town—Carl appears and he and Boo sneak off to meet in the dressing room. There he calls her out on last week’s mean girls behavior. Boo apologizes and before she can even get the words out, Carl’s shoving his tongue down her throat and all seems right with the world for half a second. That is, until Dull and Baby Megan appear and Baby Megan says some stupid crap about how this means girl code is null and void when it comes to Charlie—UNTRUE—and Boo finds out about Baby Megan’s feelings and an argument ensues. Of course, Carl is hearing all of this because he is a) standing right there and b) not deaf. So, smartly, he storms out of the room. Boo has sabotaged herself again.

In which Michelle keeps Godot waiting…YES WE WILL USE THAT JOKE FOREVER. Anyway. We return to the studio to find Godot has hung around until the bitter end and is helping clean up by stacking chairs. Michelle wants to know why he’s there, and Godot tells her it’s because he knew she wouldn’t get much of a turnout, so he wanted to support her. Michelle, suddenly extremely perceptive, picks up on Godot’s real intentions, and after some cute flirty banter about how he doesn’t care how old she is and how he’s going to teach her to chill out and surf, Michelle rejects Godot completely. Godot—who clearly has the thickest skin of any man alive, and is potentially just a robot—barely even registers the rejection. In fact, he kind of sees it as a challenge. The next day, we’re off to cheerleading practice, where Michelle tells Sasha to suck it up and deal with her shitty home life, and that quitting ballet would be the worst decision ever that she’ll regret for life. After leaving Sasha to mull over her sage advice, Michelle returns home to find a gift-wrapped coffee maker and acts confused, like she doesn’t immediately know it’s from smitten Godot. Well, we definitely do.